WhackyNation

For many years, many voices, including mine, have appealed to officials of the Olympics Committee to take the summer Olympics back to Athens, Greece, where they originated, and leave them there permanently on the familiar every-four-years basis.

One of the loudest voices calling for the action has been that of former basketball great, Bill Bradley, who made his way to the U.S. Senate several years ago. I agree with Bradley’s ideas concerning future Olympics. Among them are these:

1. Open all events in the Olympics to professionals, as well as amateurs. He reasons, as I do, that many nations already send their “pros” to the event, even though they may try to hide their professionalism — and fool no one.
2. Eliminate all team events, mainly because they generate all sorts of strange and often silly fights. My answer to this issue has long been the hope that the world’s nations unite to organize world leagues in those sports common to most nations — including baseball, soccer, basketball, hockey, and, some day, even football.
3. Find a permanent site for the winter Olympics, as well. That site, preferably, should be in a nation with a long, historic tradition for championing winter sports. The Scandinavian countries come to mind immediately.
4. With the summer and winter Olympics stationed permanently, the world leagues would attract most of the interest, because they would operate every year.

I’d like to add another proposal to the Olympics in Athens. It’s one that many persons who have heard it or read it have championed, as well. Way back in the original Olympics Games in Athens, the arts played a very important role, whether in the field of competition or as sidelights at each festival.

Why not add competitions in music, dance, drama, and other arts, perhaps even including films? Of course, in this instance the differences in language might present a few problems in judging, but I’m certain that problem would be easy to solve.

With the great advances made in worldwide television broadcasting, the Olympics’ events will be seen instantly everywhere on the globe.

With reference to the Olympics and the proposed world leagues, I am compelled to add a most important postscript. It stems from my longheld feeling that professional athletes, with very few exceptions, have more sway with people everywhere in the world than any other individuals, including presidents, elected officials, politicians, movie and TV stars, and even church leaders.

An organization that stands for the best in athleticism and espouses Christian ideals could and should lead the way in this endeavor. It’s called the Professional Athletes’ Outreach (P.A.O.), which already invests its many members with the highest ideals and exemplary character.

The members of the P.A.O. are already well known and could persuade more persons in all nations to guarantee world peace than any other individuals or groups. They deserve a chance to help bring us that elusive international peace. Why not? The others have failed thus far.

Shame on the Seattle Times and the rest of Puget Sound media for publishing a shill piece yesterday that claimed commuter rail could be added to the Eastside for a mere $37 million in improvements.

What a ridiculous, low-ball estimate.  And the fact that the story’s assertions went unchallenged is absolute proof that the newspaper is totally one-sided in favor of liberal politics and that its editors can’t even see their own bias.

The heart of the story rested in some purported study by someone inside Burlington Northern who claims that all is needed to upgrade the corridor is replacing track and ties and making small modifications to some bridges.

That’s total crap!

The current corridor is in total disrepair.  It was never engineered to modern standards.  Hillside springs and creeks undermine the track.  In some stretches, the corridor is not wide enough for parallel tracks.  In many residential neighborhoods, crossings need to be replaced and the track separated from pedestrians and parks.

$37 million!  Crap!  Try $370 million or better yet, try $3.7 billion. 

Low balling construction estimates is a repeated trick of the liberal pro-transit crowd.  Remember the bald-faced lie that Sound Transit backers made in 1994?  That light rail could be built from Northgate to the airport for $4 billion?

Same liars.  Same stupid reporters and editors.

I’m reposting a video I made a number of months ago, so you can see just how dangerous the current corridor is.

Talk about a furtive, politically motivated plan that is apparently designed to appease voters! That’s exactly what Washington State’s Governor Christine Gregoire has just proposed as a plan she wants the legislature to consider as it convenes in Olympia for a special session.

That special session, which was designed to counter a stupid decision made by five of the four justices of the State Supreme Court, should be devoted simply and quickly to restore the 1 percent cap on property-tax increases that voters approved at the polls back in 2001.

Gregoire, who was reluctant to call the special session that had been endorsed by her 2008 gubernatorial opponent, Dino Rossi, and many others, eventually approved the proposal for a special session. But she also saw an opportunity to use it as a springboard for a ridiculous property-tax plan that make no sense but has obviously been tossed out there as a supposed “tax plum” for taxpayers.

The governor’s idiotic proposal would defer 25 percent of property-tax payments for persons earning up to $57,000 a year. Note that her plan also includes the provision that the money deferred would have to be paid anyway when a property is sold. If that’s what she calls saving taxpayers money, she is undergoing a grand delusion.

Of course, many of her equally misguided Democratic Liberal friends in the legislature are saying “Hurrah for our great governor!” instead of studying her proposal to realize how ridiculous and politically inspired it is. At the same time, the Liberal news media have once again failed to detail how ridiculous and politically based the tax-deferral plan is.

Instead of offering such silly programs that accomplish nothing for the beleaguered taxpayer, why don’t Gregoire and her Democratic allies in the legislature propose a real saving plan for taxpayers? It should begin with an examination of state government itself and how vast it has grown in recent years — a growth similar to that Big Government has sustained in the national capital.

At the present time, the state is enjoying a marked increase in its surplus income — a figure in the billions of dollars. If Gregoire and the Demos are really interested in doing something special for taxpayers, why not forgot about all the spending schemes they have on the table and just give that money back to the state’s taxpayers?

I know that is too much to ask of politicians who are eternally devoted to the tax-and-spend philosophy of government operation, but why don’t the print and broadcast news media, at least, explore that possibility, instead of getting on the Gregoire band wagon, as usual, and praising her for her actions?

More and more and year by year, Washington State continues to deserve the title the political guru, Jim Farley, once gave it in jest. Even he, a Demo bigwig, saw the folly of the state’s ways when he said its name should be changed to “the Soviet of Washington.”

I don’t mind bragging about one of the best ideas I’ve ever had, even though it has failed to capture the support I had hoped it would receive. That being the case, I will repeat it once again for the umpteenth time and hope that this time someone with clout will read it and act on it.

While serving as a commentator for KIRO-TV and Radio in Seattle back in the 1980s and ‘90s, I trotted out my idea each time Pearl Harbor Day came up or the Japanese paused to commemorate the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Why, I wondered out loud, were the Japanese and the Americans calling attention each year to the devastation each visited upon the other in 1941 and 1945? Wouldn’t it be a lot better for both nations and for humanity if they set aside their bitter memories and, instead, joined to celebrate a “Reconciliation Day”?

The two nations could meet to select a day that was far removed from mid-August and December 7, and they could make plans for a mutually shared celebration on both sides of the Pacific. That celebration would be devoid of any military pomp, marching soldiers, sailors, and airmen, and any references to Pearl Harbor Day or the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

I included a wish that the two nations could begin a continuing program of exchanging visiting citizens — Americans touring the length and breadth of Japan and its islands and Japanese visiting as many cities and towns as they could within the space of a year. In each case, the visitors would take special pains to meet and converse with as many people as they could to carry out the theme of Reconciliation.

My suggestion also included the hope that both the American Congress and the Japanese Diet would act to make Reconciliation Day a permanent holiday.

I added another extremely important note to my suggestion: I said that, if the idea worked well in both nations, it should be extended to other nations around the world, thus promoting peace and putting thoughts of war on the back burner or into the trash basket.

A religious group representing all religions in Seattle gave my idea first prize in its search for the most religiously inspired messages in the news media. But the idea is still out there, waiting for action by the two nations — and eventually the entire world of nations.

One of the major nuisances faced daily by sports stars, movie and TV/Radio personalities, political figures, and all others in the limelight is the ever-present autograph hound, who thrusts a piece of paper or an article of apparel in the face of the cornered celebrity, demanding an autograph.

With rare exceptions, the celebrities feel they must provide an autograph or face the wrath of the “public.” In fact, most of these autograph hounds measure the popularity of their idols by their willingness to sign autographs. Having interviewed so many celebrities in my news-media experience, I know that virtually all of them detest autograph seekers, but they don’t dare say so out loud.

Is there a way out for the celebrities — a way to cut down on these hordes of pen-in-hand autograph wackos? I think there is a great way out of the dilemma; I proposed it several years ago in TV and radio commentaries and in speeches on several occasions. Unfortunately, the celebrities haven’t adopted the idea, even though it would work to their advantage in several ways.

I proposed that these stars of cinema, stage, sports, TV, radio, and public office have business cards printed with their names and a place for their signature on one side and a message somewhat like this on the reverse side:

“I am pleased to offer you this autographed card with the hope that you will honor me with a donation of any size to my favorite charity….(the name and address of the charity).”

That’s the general idea of the message. Of course, the celebrity could phrase it in any way he or she pleased. Also, the celebrity could sign the cards in advance and simply hand them out to the autograph seekers or, if he or she wished, sign them as the cards were handed out. Advance signing would be far more convenient and would eliminate those long, crowded sessions the celebrities must endure before and after performances, games, or whatever.

And suppose the pestiferous autograph hound refused to be satisfied with an autographed card. Tough. The celebrity has done his or her duty, and the fan can lump it. How could the signature seeker complain — and to whom?

I’ll wager that if celebrities adopted this idea, they would find that the long lines of autograph seekers would soon diminish, and, just maybe, their charities would receive some unexpected donations. Presto! Two good results simultaneously!

Do the crafty Norwegians know something we don’t know or should know? That’s the impression I got upon reading a recent Associated Press dispatch from Oslo about a “doomsday vault dug into an already frigid Arctic mountainside to protect the world’s seeds in case of a global catastrophe.”

The Norwegians have created what they call the Svalbard Global Seed Vault by using explosives to carve a deep cavern in the permafrost of a remote island north of Norway in the frozen Arctic Ocean. And into that cavern or huge cave they have deposited close to 5,000,000 agricultural seeds to protect them from various threats.

It’s quite obvious that the anxious Norwegians have been brainwashed, unfortunately, by the global-warming camp, which is prominent in some European countries and has been responsible for the misguided alarmist reports that have been emanating from the United Nations and its corps of pseudo-scientists.

The Norwegians have pointed to climate change, which has become the euphemism for global warming, as one of the reasons they engineered the doomsday vault, which is situated 300 miles north of the mainland on the Svalbard Archipelago.  However, they have also listed some valid reasons for the unusual project

The other reasons, as reported by the A.P., include protection from severe “plant epidemics, natural disasters, or war.” Now, those reasons make sense and are compatible with honest science and the possibilities of problems that could be posed by Mother Nature or the follies of mankind.

Should the United States and other nations copy the Norwegians’ example and create caves or other “vaults” to put away seeds and any other items that might be destroyed by Mother Nature’s angry tantrums or by, say, a nuclear war? I think it would be a good idea.

For example, as pointed out by my good friend, Bob Felix, in his remarkable new book, “Not by Fire But by Ice,” there is a possibility that a real danger is ahead for the planet. It is a combination of the coming Ice Age and the magnetic reversal that is now due and could wreak havoc on many regions of earth with drastic changes in weather conditions, temperature changes, and other phenomena.

That is a possibility that has already been forecast by legitimate climatologists in the U.S. and Europe. In that light, a doomsday vault, a la Norwegian style, might be a great idea for all nations to consider.

Norway’s vault has been equipped with powerful cooling units to control the temperature inside when the temperature outside rises above the freezing level, which sometimes happens in the Arctic Ocean. The A.P. quoted one of the vault project’s directors, Cary Fowler, executive director of the Rome-based Global Crop Diversity Trust, a partner of the project, as saying:

‘The seed vault is the perfect place for keeping seeds safe for centuries. At these temperatures, seeds for important crops like wheat, barley, and peas can last for up to 1,000 years.” It makes sense in view of the forthcoming Ice Age and magnetic reversal.

As could have been expected, the perpetrators of the colossal global-warming mythology, led by the biggest liar of them all, former Vice President Al Gore, stand to make millions, billions, or even trillions in profits in the products and services they have begun to sell industry, business, and the public in the U.S. and around the world.

Fortune Magazine has blown the lid off the money-making hoax with a report that Gore has joined forces “with a venture capital company that is seeking to profit from the move toward ‘clean technology’ in the $6 trillion global-energy business. Gore is becoming a hands-on partner at Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers, a major Silicon Valley venture-capital firm where an old friend, John Doerr, is a partner.”

Gore has wasted no time in capitalizing on his receipt of a Nobel Peace Prize, of all things. It was an award the Nobel people should have had more sense than to give to a man who has manufactured a new career based on non-scientific nonsense and misrepresentations of true climate science.

Fortune tells us that in the next few years “more than a third of Kleiner’s latest fund, which totals $600 million, will reportedly be invested in technologies that seek to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions.” Those technologies include firms “making microbes to scrub old oil receptacles, build large solar-power farms, develop solid-oxide fuel cells, and design equipment for use in electric-car batteries.”

When are the world’s legitimate scientists — and they are in the distinct majority — going to rise up as one and blow the whistle on Gore and the rest of his global-warming advocates? The scientists’ silence is not only permitting the global warmers to go on fleecing industry and the public; it is allowing Gore and his misguided pals to distort honest science.

Gore has the support of an equally misguided crop of so-called “scientists” in the United Nations, who keep issuing scientifically flawed reports in support of the global-warming hoax and the need for the U.S. and other nations to bankrupt themselves with outlandish schemes to prevent a danger that isn’t there.

President Bush, who has tried half-heartedly to sidetrack the global warmers, should call on the world’s leading climatologists to set the record straight and derail the global-warming movement before it deals severe monetary damage to the U.S. and the world. To do so, all he needs is the report compiled by Oregon’s brilliant scientist, Dr. Arthur Robinson, whose survey a few years ago registered the names of 20,000 honest climatologists who debunked the global-warming myth.

Once and for all, the American public and the people of all other nations, as well, need to be told the truth about the non-existent danger Gore & Co. have been peddling in books, films, and, now, in awards like the Nobel Peace Prize to undeserving people. At the same time, the Wall Street Journal and the few other existing Conservative news media should start pointing the finger at those college and university Liberals who have joined the global-warming clan in order to protect lucrative grants and other awards.

I know you don’t like the “I Told You So” routine. And neither do I, really. But sometimes it’s necessary to set things right and to indicate what should have been done. That is exactly the case with the Fun Forest, whose operators now say it will close down in two years at the Seattle Center because it isn’t attracting the crowds it needs to make a profit.

Well, I’ll be damned! The Fun Forest never should have been retained at the Center after the 1962 Seattle World’s Fair, and guess whose voice was loudest in saying that the Center was no place for the Fun Forest in the first place. That voice was mine back then in daily columns for the Seattle Times.

But my entreaties weren’t heard, despite the fact that I was one of the backers of the Seattle Center from the beginning and one of the cheerleaders when the World’s Fair idea was born. I was also one of the persons, along with Bob Block, who argued for the unique Center concept when it was first proposed.

That concept was for the creation of the Center as an inner-city park for the 20 Somethings and the adult population of the region. It was conceived as a place for all the arts, with emphasis on great music, including opera productions, musicals, chamber music, and good jazz. It was also to be a center for all types of theater, as well as one for the display of all kinds of art, from drawings and paintings to sculpture and the crafts.

In addition, it was originally designed to be a park for strollers, with gardens, bushes, trees, flowers, and even a small outdoor fish pond. In other words, it was to be an inner-city paradise for young people and adults — a place to relax, on one hand, and to enjoy the world of the performing and visual arts.

At the end of the World’s Fair, I remember arguing strongly for eliminating the Fair’s Fun Forest and moving it across the street on acreage once controlled by the Transit System. I also proposed that the city ask Walt Disney Enterprises to use the land across from the Center for an amusement park for children and young people.

I was disappointed when the city decided to retain the Fun Forest at the Center — and disappointed again when it permitted billionaire Paul Allen to erect his rock-n-roll monstrosity in the Center, an abomination which shut out several other far more appropriate projects harmonizing with the original adult theme for the Center. I opposed the Allen monstrosity, too.

Now, the expected has come to pass. The Fun Forest people want out, because they’re losing money. And the Paul Allen fiasco, which never should have been built at the Center, is also experiencing a lack of interest and lowered attendance. I Told You So.

Now the city is in the midst of feverish plans to redesign the Center, all because, it says, the Center is losing money, too. Little wonder that it is losing money. The original plan for a park appealing mainly to the adult population and dedicated to all the arts should be revived. And the accent on making money should be banished. Parks are for people, who have already been taxed to keep them going.

You’d never know it because of the way the Liberal and pro-Democratic news media have played it, but former Senator Dino Rossi, Republican, has just scored an important victory over the opponent he will face in the 2008 race for governor of Washington State, Christine Gregoire.

Since the media refused to play the report with the honesty it deserves, I will do it in this commentary. Permit me to recap the incident. When the State Supreme Court unwisely struck down I-747, the Tim Eyman tax-saving measure that was approved by the public by a wide margin, Rossi said immediately afterward that the governor should call a special session of the Legislature to right the wrong that had been done by the misguided court.

At the time, Gregoire could say only that the tax matter could be looked at when the Legislature meets next year. Where Rossi declared that the Legislature’s prime duty was to restore the tax-cutting measure, Gregoire was reported to have said only that the issue should be left to the Legislature.

Now, to Chapter 2 of the political episode. Apparently the Demos had a talk with their reluctant governor, because Governor Gregoire has just announced that she has changed her mind and has now called for a special session to consider the issue, which has drawn wide-scale anger from the taxpaying public.

The way the media reported it, one would have thought that the special-session idea was Governor Gregoire’s in the first place. In the reports by the Seattle newspapers, mention that Rossi had called for a special session weeks earlier was briefly mentioned far down in the articles.

Now, if I were still running the Post-Intelligencer, the Page 1 lead on the report would have been that “Governor Gregoire has belatedly agreed with her adversary, Dino Rossi, that a special should be called on the tax issue because it has become a major issue with the voters.” In this case, I would have added “the voters who were insulted by the Supreme Court, five of whose members said, in effect, that the voters didn’t know what they were doing when they approved I-747.”

You see what I mean? The news media has already indicated which of the two gubernatorial candidates it favors and which one will receive the best play in the coming campaign. Frankly speaking, it’s rotten journalism and clearly indicates that the news media, print and broadcast, in Seattle and in the U.S. need a political housecleaning.

Where in the world are the newspaper publishers and owners of the TV and radio stations these days? Why aren’t they cleaning house and demanding that their reporters, editors, anchors, and commentators bring back the onetime objectivity in the news media and quit favoring the Liberals in political races?

And where, pray tell, is the News Council that was established several years ago to investigate the press and to point out those instances in which reporters slant their “news” articles with their Liberal prejudices?

I hope you don’t mind this very personal and deeply felt note of thanks on this important date that is uniquely American, Thanksgiving Day. First, I give thanks to all those great and not-so-great citizens of the past who created and expanded the American Dream as it became the planet’s most remarkable cradle of freedom and liberty.

I thank my wonderful father and mother, both of whom had the willingness and foresight to leave Italy and play a role in the American Dream. The greatest gift they could have given me and my brother and sister was the privilege of being born in and enjoying the freedoms provided by this great nation.

I give thanks, too, for all those teachers and friends who played a role in my education and training — especially George H. Taylor, the high-school English teacher, a true martinet, who pounded all the best basics of writing into my young brain and made my career as a writer, journalist, and communicator a possibility.

I thank all those marvelous souls along the way who guided my interests in music, playing the violin and piano, absorbing all aspects of the visual and performing arts, and learning the rudiments and the profundities of running a large daily newspaper, as well as the fundamentals of television and radio broadcasts.

But, most of all, I thank the Lord for giving me the greatest gifts of them all — a beautiful, deeply loving and caring wife, Madeleine, and four of the finest children in the world — Judy, Richard, and the twins, Lynne and Diane — as well as a bevy of the most adorable grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

I have been lucky enough to attract so many super friends that I cannot list them all. But they know who they are. And I rely on them for an almost daily supplement of kind words, good ideas, and even a deserved scold when I have stepped out of line or said an unkind word.

How lucky can a man be in this day and age of worldwide terrorism and conflict, poverty-stricken nations, and terrible disease? The answer is a man can be as lucky as I have been. Yes, I have had to hurdle or circumvent a variety of problems, setbacks, and ailments.

But I insist that I am the luckiest man alive for all the reasons I have put forward in this commentary and for many more I can’t detail at this moment. All of it points to one more major point in my adventurous life: I owe it all, really, to my faith, my strong, never bending belief in God.

It was a faith instilled in me by my saintly Mom and Dad. For instance, I remember vividly the time I was stricken with a very serious ailment when I was about 7 years old. My Mom picked up a crucifix, held it over me, and prayed to St. Joseph, the patron saint of the Catholic Church. I won’t call it a miracle, but my 104-degree fever dropped to normal that night, and my recovery began the next morning. Did St. Joe do it, as my mother stated?

Of course he did! I told you I was the luckiest man alive, didn’t I? Happy Thanksgiving!

Democrats and Liberals (who are one and the same for all practical purposes) like to point to reports that anywhere from 75 to 95 percent of black voters vote for Democratic candidates and issues when they go to the polls — if they go to the polls, that is.

If those figures are correct or nearly correct, why are so many African-American citizens supporters of Democrats and Liberals? I’ve tackled this thorny issue before on many occasions, but my answer has always been the same — and here it is:

For decades, Democratic politicians in and out of Congress have taken actions which, in effect, keep America’s black population in virtual slavery! Yes, I said “slavery”! How so? In many devious, calculated ways.

Democrats and Liberals have championed giveaway programs and laws designed to benefit communities that are in almost hopeless poverty, most of whose dwellers are blacks in neighborhoods one could classify as ghettoes. Call these giveaways what you will; in this case, I call them bribes to keep African-Americans from becoming a vital part of mainstream America — something most Republicans want for all blacks.

The refrain to an old song asks “How’re you gonna keep ‘em down on the farm?” With a slight alteration, it is substantially what the Democrats are saying to the black community, which it has been hand-feeding to “keep ‘em down in the ghetto.”

If the Democratic Party truly wanted to bring all blacks into mainstream America, it would long ago have sponsored programs elevating blacks into responsible and well-paying positions in business, industry, and corporate America. And it would have thrown its support behind a national movement to end segregated neighborhoods everywhere.

When are the political voices in Black America going to wake up and realize that they have been kept captive for decades by Democrats and Liberals in high places from the FDR and Lyndon Johnson era through the Clinton years? When are they going to step forward and demand the same status in business, industry, and the professions that whites enjoy?

Leaders of the black community should recognize that Asian and Hispanic citizens are already enjoying higher positions in the American economy. They should be asking why the same advances haven’t been made available to many blacks.

If they start asking these hard questions, they will discover the fact that the Democrats’ longtime support of giveaway government programs aren’t “giveaway” programs at all. They are, purely and simply, bribes designed to keep African-Americans from demanding the same status in industry, business, and the professions as whites and many Asians and Hispanics now enjoy.

The Emancipation Proclamation may have freed the slaves, but the Democrats and their Liberal friends have created a new kind of slavery for blacks — bureaucratically controlled giveaway programs to “keep them down on the farm.” And the sooner thinking Americans realize that, the better the nation will be.

A great idea is worth repeating — at least until someone with imagination and clout grabs the idea and puts it into practice. This idea was born, then repeated many times, way back in the 1950s and 1960s while I was serving as the critic-at-large for the Seattle Times.

In the music field that I covered for close to 20 years, what is called “serious” music (as if other forms of music weren’t “serious”) was carefully disassociated from all other forms of musical performance, including Broadway and Hollywood musicals. In the process, I noted that the “serious” folks didn’t care to mingle with the “pop” folks outside the concert hall. It reminded me of the squabble between the Cohens and the Kellys.

Thus, on one night, I might be covering a production of Verdi’s “Aida” or Puccini’s “La Boheme,” and two or three nights later, sitting in the same theater seat, I might be reviewing a performance of the Lerner-Loewe musical, “My Fair Lady,” or Gershwin’s “Porgy and Bess.”

It became obvious to me that, while the music was somewhat different on each occasion, the audiences were substantially the same, with the “Cohens and Kellys” left outside in the mezzanine. The reactions of the audiences were similar in all respects. It was then that I wondered: “Why are these productions separated by style and tradition?”

Why, then, I continued wondering, can’t all these supposedly disparate but entertaining musical-art forms be joined together and live as one under the same roof? As the idea grew and my wonderment broadened, I wrote my first column on the subject, asking, in effect, why the opera companies of America didn’t offer, say, “Aida” and “Porgy and Bess” in the same musical series and on the same artistic footing….?

Well, the hardened opera aficionado might say, opera is sung from beginning to end, while musicals are primarily spoken dramas with occasional musical tunes. The history of music speaks otherwise. Early on, composers like Handel and others wrote many operas that were mostly recitative (spoken lines), with an occasional aria tossed in, not unlike a Broadway musical.

Frankly, I believe the American musical scene would be dramatically enhanced by a marriage of all styles of productions — operas and musicals — and by the same companies and even the same performers. In fact, I’ll wager that such a marriage would help free many opera companies from their annual deficits and turn red ink to blue or black.

I’m convinced that box-office receipts would soar and banish the financial blues that opera companies sing every year, blues that are directed at wealthy donors and foundations. Finally, the marriage I’ve been promoting for many years would level the playing field for many music lovers, and the opera addicts would soon find they were similarly addicted to the hit musicals.

I’m reminded of something an old friend, Gene Linden, Seattle Opera’s first conductor, told me about his experiences while studying in Rome and Vienna. “It was a funny thing, Lou. Do you know what those opera fans in the European cities would do immediately after a performance? They would head for the nearest night club to hear the best in American jazz.” You see. Smart audiences are way ahead of the game. Metropolitan Opera and San Francisco Opera, please copy!

I have a great suggestion for Bill Gates, the brilliant chief wizard of the Microsoft Corporation, and I hope someone carries it to him, since I have been unable to break through his wall of receptionists, secretaries, and others for several years, even though I have many more valuable ideas for him and Microsoft.

The suggestion referred to involves a complaint he has been making for some time now and which addresses an issue that grows more serious by the day for the U.S. In his most recent statement, Gates lamented the fact that the nation is not turning out the technicians and engineers that are needed to keep our economy going and steadily improving.

Gates referred to the problem as one for Microsoft in particular. He said his firm, a world leader in computer technology, relies on “thousands of engineers skilled in math and computer science” and that the jobs are there waiting but the workers needed to fill them are not being trained.

My idea for Gates has several potentials I hope he will consider. The first concerns Microsoft itself, as well as Gates and Steve Balmer, who is now running the company as Gates devotes most of his time to his foundation. Why don’t Gates and Balmer create their own school at Microsoft to train the engineers they will need?

Another potential goes this way: Why don’t Gates and Balmer take their case to school systems in Washington State and to all other state school systems, as well? For years, I have been pleading for all states to follow the lead set by states like Ohio, Illinois, and a few others in establishing technical high schools to train the much needed workers of the future?

I was a graduate of such a high school, East Technical in Cleveland, which was one of two high-tech schools in the Greater Cleveland area. While there, I was enrolled in the five-year preparatory course under the Smith-Hughes Act, which Congress passed back in the 1930s to begin filling the need for high-tech workers.

As a result, East Technical and West Technical High Schools were soon filling the skilled-worker needs of Cleveland’s mammoth industrial complex — and has continued to do it to this day. In this day and age, the computer sciences are very much a part of the skilled training courses needed — and which Gates says Microsoft needs.

Still another potential has just been announced by the Federal Way School System, which is creating a special course that will concentrate on science and technology, very much like the technical schools in Cleveland. The new academy will include youngsters from Grades 6 through 12.

The sad note in Federal Way’s case is that the much larger Seattle Public School System has rejected proposals for establishing science-and-technical schools for the past three years and shows no signs of doing so in the future. Now, there’s a target for you to work on, Messrs. Gates and Balmer!

Technical-training schools would accomplish at least one other desirable goal — which is to reduce the number of technically trained migrants from the Far East, who have been taking the jobs that should have been filled by American-born students.